Let's See What Sticks
by tlhgeek
Summary: Xander takes a part-time job at a costume shop leading up to Halloween. As a bonus he is given a box of extra bits to 'spice up' his costume. This can only end well. A not to serious fic about the over-the-top of a rather powerful Xander Harris
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One: Hard Work Pays Off**

Alexander LaVelle Harris A.K.A. Xander was rather bored this week. Not much had come up recently due to a small argument with Buffy he was sidelined from patrols. At least from ones with her. Oh how that idea had percolated but, first Xander had to prepare. He couldn't exactly grab slaying supplies from the library at the moment and unless he had a plan he was going to become Vamp food on his first night out. Now that semi-repeating crossbow he had seen tucked away in the corner of the Sport-O-Rama sporting goods store would be perfect but, given that it was two hundred dollars on it's own not including bolts he would need to buy it was a bit out of his price range unless he wanted to bankrupt his road-trip fund.

Xander sighed and thought to himself, _'That road trip is all but dead now, with Jesse gone and Willow on Team Slayer in just about everything it's just me left. Still I made promise with Willow and Jesse that I would go on that trip and as long as I'm on this godforsaken rock I'm going to keep it.'_

Xander decided to look for a part time job, to give him something to do and to build up funds for his solo-slaying plans. A few days worth of work and an incident involving Buffy and a frat house had turned up with a job for Xander. He managed to grab an interview as a cashier until Halloween at Ethan's Costume Shop. The fact that all of the other interviewee's were dealing with health issues due to a snake demon he had little competition and the hours he would receive would easily meet his goals. The discount on costumes was just a bonus. The only downsides for the job was dealing with the few particularly bratty kids and having to check out Buffy and Willow when they came in to purchase costumes. Their questioning looks and confusion meant he was definitely getting interrogated later. On the upside he managed to get out of guarding children for trick-or-treating as apparently Xander spending less time with Buffy and working a job, 'like all these ungrateful brats should' had put him in Principal Snyder's good books for now.

* * *

"Ok Xander what's the deal? When did you get a job?" Buffy asked while Willow made general agreeing sounds and didn't quite add much to the conversation.

"A few weeks ago after the Reptile Boy incident, you seemed a bit distracted after that so I guess you didn't notice. Then again you two benched me ever since Ampata so it's not like you have really been paying attention to my life anyways." Xander replied, trying to see if they had changed their minds.

"W-we told you it's dangerous and Buffy can handle herself." Willow responded, quickly shutting Xander down.

"Besides why do you need a job? It's not like you have anything to spend it on that you need.." Buffy replied thoughtlessly. Willow just winced seeing Xander's expression darken.

Growling Xander bit back, "Not all of us can go drain daddy's credit card on things we _need_ when we ditch our friends for the summer." Xander turned straightening up from his casual slouch and marched away. The faintest glimmer of greenish yellow sparking in his eyes.

* * *

The next few days went about as could be expected until the day of Hallowen arrived. Ethan came out from the back storeroom smirking and holding a large cardboard box overflowing with various bits and pieces from partial costumes.

"Well my boy that's a wrap as they say. I've got your remaining pay here in my back pocket if you could take this." He said with a grunt handing Xander the box. After tucking his envelope of pay into Xander's front shirt pocket, "Now you can have this box of extra odds and ends to spice up that boring soldier costume of yours. Have an exciting night my boy I'm sure it will be one to remember."

"T-Thank you sir!" Xander replied with a shocked grin. "I certainly will." Xander headed home to see what he could add to his costume, he had only bought the thing to have a cheap costume for parties. With a few hours before he would try to meet up with Willow and Buffy in what felt like the dozenth attempt to smooth things over and entice them to a party, he had plenty of time to figure out what to add to his costume.

* * *

 **Author's Basement: So folks this is a cheesy fic to get my creativity back in shape while I work on Gamer: Odyssey. Still looking for votes on my profile poll about that by the way. Expect chapters in this fic to be short and random in their update schedule.**

 **For now I have a question for the reviews. This is going to be a cheesy crackish fic that involves an absurd level of power gain for Xander though only for a short bit before going back to nothing until the events of the Season Two Finale. Obviously I am making some obvious tweaks to the canon to begin with.**

 **So with that in mind, What Cheesy, OP, Badass, and otherwise awesome things do want Xander to find in the box that he can add to his costume?**

 **Feel free to give me as much detail as you like with the what's and why's. I have some ideas in mind but I want more since the whole point of this is to be a bit absurd but, fun.**


	2. Arts, Crafts and, Cosmic Empowerment

At first Xander had a hard time working out how he was going to bring the box of odds and ends together. After few moments thought he decided that while the soldier look was good, it would be far more entertaining if he kitted his costume out like almost every RPG character he had ever made wound up looking. A skill monkey who geared himself in anything and everything that helped. The concept of a sort of Shadowrun style character began firming in his mind, a fellow with the skill to fix just about any problem, a jack of all trades, but one that had no problems cheating to get that edge over the specialists.

He began digging about in the box while sitting in his room, there were a few items that while cool were a little to garish or clunky to fit his idea. The Infinity Gauntlet prop got set aside, being far to large and dented to wear, though the infinity gems had potential if he could pry them out. He found what looked like a DC style Lantern ring, though it was obvious why it didn't sell, for some reason the plastic it was made from was clear and the symbol warped oddly. Still it made a good fit for a crystal foci ring for his character so in the 'yes' pile it went. A light-saber flashlight with belt ring joined it quickly. Several packs of stickers ranging from Elven script to Norse runes along with several plastic tools quickly joined his pile, though he did take a few minutes happily slapping said stickers on just about everything with special attention to putting several Norse runes on a pink rubber mallet as a silly joke about stealing Mjolnir from Thor to make furniture popped into his head.

Enjoying his new project he found a massive pack of temporary tattoos and began slapping them on along his arms and chest, he even stuck a few up his neck as if they were reaching for his face. Rooting around in the box he found an oddly fancy looking tangle of jewelry attached to a pair of dog tags. Untangling the set he saw the dog tags read as S. Carter on one line and SG on the next although it may have originally said more as the tags were rather damaged, the second tag was no better than the first although he did find the oddly blocky texture of the dog tags odd. He added the tags to the costume pile, figuring they would work as well as any for his 'soldier of fortune'. The jewelry once untangled was a mixture of gold and amber filigree, although sturdier than it first appeared, amounting to a hand piece or partial glove and another looking like a large round belt buckle of similar design. Seeing an opportunity here he grabbed a small stash of red paint and glue. A few minutes of elbow grease had netted him five out of six Infinity gems, unfortunately the blue one broke into pieces during his attempts, undeterred he began gluing the various gems onto the partial glove and accented the gold with bits of scarlet red paint. After placing the side project under his desk lamp in the hopes of drying it in time he decided to empty out the box. Heading back to the box he found a broken sonic screwdriver, although it still lit up when press the handle was bent and the sound was rather off. Thinking about it he also added a few lines of red accent and stickers onto the toy revolver he had and with some fiddling turned the broken screwdriver and revolver into a makeshift ray gun he had grabbed for his costume.

Turning back to the box he pulled out the last three items; a colorful but jagged and bent dagger that looked like someone had turned a rainbow into a ritual dagger, a blue cloak with red straps that seemed somewhat familiar to Xander although he couldn't place it and lastly, a slightly over-sized key chain sword and scabbard both of relatively simple European design in blue and gold, the scabbard had again simple but elegant decoration of patterned intersections along it's length. With a shrug he decided the dagger and key chain would work as good accessories to tuck into the soldier fatigues pockets and the cloak would give him a mysterious look and give him the perfect place to affix the amber and gold belt buckle to his chest to tie into his thoughts with the glove. Along with a simple dull green duffle bag for goodies a few spare geeky books and comics, plus a change of clothes if needed Xander deemed his costume complete. All in all the final product looked, well admittedly it looked somewhat odd, it would probably be something that the geeky of Sunydale would find interesting but, the popular would likely mock or be confused by.

To Xander though it was Badass with a capital B, he had always gotten a rush whenever it came to making something out of disparate parts, he had very much enjoyed primary school craft projects and it was a large part of why he had taken wood and metal shop over his years in high school. Unfortunately his father seemed to take a perverse pleasure in destroying anything Xander made so many of the projects he completed in class where either donated or left to the school. It had rapidly become amusing to Xander to hear Snyder bitch about destroyed school property when a fair amount of it was being repaired or flat out made by Xander in his shop classes. Xander shaking his head of the cobwebs his train of thought had wandered into decided to spend the time remaining for his glove and revolver to dry reading comics and generally geeking out.

* * *

Several hours later and aside from seeing Willow and Buffy leading a large pack of unruly children once he had spent most of his time bouncing from party to party looking for one that felt 'right'. The obvious jealousy and bad attitude that Buffy had to his freedom that night had put a damper on things, especially when she attempted to dump the horde of kids on him so she could go find Angel. Xander had taken a great deal of pleasure in simply walking away from that moment although not before he convinced the children that Buffy knew all the best candy spots and they just had to ask her.

Xander did not prank often usually preferring the fun of witty repartee with Cordelia, however the last week or so of working with Ethan and hearing the various pranks he had pulled had instilled taste in such activities. Although it may have also been due to the fact that Xander has had very few positive adult figures in his life and none were so focused on him as Ethan had been while they had worked together. While he did know and respect a few; Giles, Mrs. Summers and, Ms. Calendar came to mind they didn't spend all that much time with Xander. The first two being more focused on Buffy for obvious reasons and the last on Willow. Ethan had given Xander a job and what's more had given him an adult figure to emulate and contrast himself with. Xander did not totally agree with Ethan on ethics or morals and in point of fact had argued with him several times on the difference between a prank and bullying or when 'good fun' crossed the line into hurting people. If anything Xander's stubborn and independent attitude had almost as much impact on Ethan as it had had on Xander.

All of the previous is significant due to the fact that it was such debates and arguments with Xander had convinced Ethan to add several protections to his spell that evening, to lessen the harm it might cause and protect at the very least true innocents. Of course such protections do not come without a cost especially when invoking a deity. The fact that Ethan had always focused on the chaotic aspects of Janus as opposed to his more primary domains of time, transition and change did not help these costs. In the end the changes Ethan had made required their to be a primary target to the spell, while he would still get the desired affect of turning his customers into their costumes, something or someone would need to be the focus of Janus' energies as a heat sink of sorts. It is also important to remember that while even the most stubborn of adults can change their ways, most of them will resent every step of the way. This good natured resentment resulted in that with the extra charge added to any one of the items in Xanders box that he would be the focus of Ethan's Halloween Spell. Of course ignorance of foreign factors especially when using chaos magic always produces unexpected results.

So it came to be that a young man already marked by and experienced in fighting possession, wearing bits and pieces of costumes from several disparate sources, who had up until recently all but lived daily in the immediate vicinity of a semi-active Hellmouth and last but not least, a young man who had already marked himself as an agent of chaos, change and, defiance by breaking prophecy and altering the Slayer line forever was the focus of all the excess energies of a spell that was made to turn people into the people and things they had dressed up as.

* * *

Xander woke up to shouting, which was not a particularly new experience for him. Being confused as to why he was waking up with no memory of losing consciousness was however still somewhat novel. As he blinked open his eyes he found himself lying on silky grass that seemed to lack any of the itchiness or roughness of normal grass. Above him was a night sky full of stars and lazy comets and meteor showers in colors far more vibrant than he had ever seen in the sky before. Despite the bickering and shouting of several people both men and women he felt oddly calm and centered. That is until he heard a laugh that chilled him to his bones while simultaneously filling his gut with hot rage. It was that damn Hyena cackle in his voice that he had heard. As he began moving he began sorting out what those around him had been talking about.

One voice, a woman's, argued passionately, "His body isn't a toy for you to play with!"

Another voice, a man this time snapped back with a slight drunken slur, "It's not like he's using it at the moment, hell if it weren't for my gems he's wearing, his brain would have probably dribbled out his ears by now."

Then it was that damn cackle, the Hyena drawled out in a smug tone, "I've been here the longest and I already know the controls, heh, I think I'll be the one running this sh-urk!"

The figures that had been standing around Xander froze. Hyena who resembled Xander with a leather jacket, somewhat canine features and a mane bristle stiff hairs around his jaw and neck. A neck currently gripped in Xander's hand holding Hyena off the ground, Hyena's eyes were wide and full of fear as he tensed and stilled. Around Xander and Hyena the remaining eight figures took in the change in circumstances in varying degrees of shock, fear and in a few cases, respect. There was a somewhat short young woman comparable to Buffy in height, however she held herself with a great deal more poise and strength than Buffy and was most certainly a natural blonde watching with an expression of utter surprise that was quickly smothered under a stoic facade, and a quick straightening of her blue and white armored dress. Next to her was another blonde woman in black cargo pants and a black sleeveless shirt, her hair was cut short and around her neck she wore a pair of dog tags her reaction was subtle with only a small widening of her eyes and a widening of her stance to gain more stability. Opposite to the pair of blondes were three more figures. The first was a slightly wobbly man in elaborate red and gold armor with no helmet. He was of a relatively standard if fit build judging by the armor with a short cropped goatee and short wavy black hair, the smirk adorning his face dropped as his eyes widened comically large and he stumbled backwards in surprise. On his left a woman in elaborate robes and shawls widened her eyes before they narrowed in calculating interest. A familiar golden and amber glove worn on her hand. On the armored mans left a woman with long purple hair and concealing robes merely to a half step back and further reaction hidden by her robes aside from her hand sliding to the empty dagger-sheath on her hip. Further away from the rest of the group the last three had gathered. A large tanned man with sharp features and long dreadlocks in a stylish but rugged leather greatcoat grinned slightly with a glimmer of respect entering his eyes. Next to him was a tall 'man' with pointed ears and long midnight black hair, the occasional flicker of silver and white disfiguring his features for the shortest of moments as his eyes sharpened on Xander. Lastly was the most unusual figure of all, a green man of excellent build, red eyes and muted features stood in a blue cloak and a crossed pair of red straps. His reaction was the hardest to read out of them all as all Xander could see was a simple straightening of posture. The realization that he could see and perceive all of them while simultaneously catching the Hyena was mentally filed under 'unimportant, deal with later'.

The sudden silence was broken by Xanders voice as even and cold as it had ever been, "What is going on? Who are you people?" giving Hyena a slight shake, "And what are _**you**_ doing here?"

* * *

 **Author's Basement: So... I'm tired but happy I got this bit done. I got a ton of great ideas some of them late but overall pretty easy to integrate. Anyways I'm betting most of the characters are pretty obvious but I'm curious if anyone can come up with the full list. One of them is pretty AU from his canon version anyways. Looking forward to hear what you all think. Feel free to throw ideas of what you think Xander can get up to with his new 'toys'.**


	3. Negotiation through Superior Firepower

The clearing was silent for a moment as a creeping chill began building at the edge of the visible grass. The irritating giggle that was a sharp reminder of numerous guilty nightmares broke the quiet.

"Well _ghk_ , pup looks like you do have some fire in you." Hyena growled out choking somewhat in Xander's grip.

Xander deciding to focus on Hyena before the others narrowed his eyes, "Answer the question fleabag! Why are you here? I'm smart enough to realize this is my mind or some similar representation and before I deal with these new visitors, I want to know why you are still here."

Hyena grinned despite the situation, "I liked you too much to leave pup, I felt the others losing their possessions but you have such potential I wasn't going too miss out on that. You are an alpha pup, get some years on you and you'll be a damn strong one too. So I decided to dive into your subconscious. No more driving until you were gone or you let me. You had strong enough pack instincts and enough buried anger to make me a _nice_ little nest in your Id."

Xander's expression had grown more stony and stoic as Hyena explained. The cold began spreading fingers of frost towards Hyena and Xander. Taking a breath Xander responded, "So you've been here since I guess that's why I remember what happened? The rest of the pack didn't. You better have damn good reason for me not end you after the crap you pulled."

Hyena lost his grin as he seemed to panic for a moment, "Hey! None of that, kill me and you damage your own mind I've been here too long boya. I can provide you with strength and my senses. It's not like I made you do anything all that bad, you've wanted the blonde for ages."

Darkness joined the frost as they lurched forward to begin freezing Hyena's legs, "Buffy could turn you into a pretzel on a bad day but as terrible as that is I don't expect an animal like you to understand how wrong that was. The problem is like you said, I do have strong pack instincts and you attacked my pack." The frost had reached Hyena's neck and slipped under Xander's fingers without harm. " **You. Hurt. Willow.** " Xander finished as he crushed the frozen neck of Hyena and shattered his remains with an mechanical calm.

* * *

A moment afterwards he staggered forward holding his head. With a wave of his hand his, the tools on his form flashed for a moment as an overstuffed recliner formed before him. As he turned and slumped into the chair, while still holding his head in one hand, he glared at the gathered figures.

Another hand wave and a variety of relatively simple chairs and a long table formed between him and his mental visitors. "So! Now that I've made it clear that I will destroy any invader in my head that I consider at threat even if it means harming myself in the process I imagine you understand the stakes. So who are you people and why are you here?"

The purple-haired figure stepped up and delicately sat in a chair near Xander who was seated at the head of the table. "I believe I can answer that. From what little I can gather of your current form without casting further spells to determine more. You appear to have an item or two belonging to each of us aside from the beast man you just... removed. I believe you are the subject, victim or, focus of a spell that has summoned us or perhaps copies of us meant to possess you for a short period of time. I believe that having so many varied items... 'jammed the door' so to speak. Instead of any one of us possessing you we all were pulled into your mind."

Xander gave the violet tressed woman a nod, before glaring at the gold and scarlet armored figure, "So what the hell made **you** think you had any right to use my body?"

The figure grinned cockily and swaggered into a seat next the robed woman. While waving a gauntlet set with five large gemstones. "This is why boy. Outside of time these gems grant me unlimited power and due to that I think I'll be taking control of this meeting." He slurred smugly as the blue gem began to glow before sputtering out. The gems and the gauntlet holding them began to dissolve.

Xander grinned before waving the same gauntlet at the armored figure. "You might be some power mad version of Tony Stark with Infinity Gems but I have them as well and this is **my** mind, homefield advantage. Also I'm fairly certain with this I can copy your knowledge but your ego, greed and, attitude aren't welcome anymore. Buh-Bye now." Xander blew off his gauntleted palm as Tony Stark, Technomancer and Iron Overlord of Earth-25667 dissolved into nothing but knowledge and skill to be absorbed by Xander's mind. Another flick of the hand and the same happened to the woman wearing the shawls and wielding the gold and amber gauntlet.

"Was it necessary to kill them?" The shorter blonde woman in the silver and blue armored dress asked, as she gracefully found a seat opposite from the robed woman.

Xander shrugged, "I can't afford any Starscreams in my mind... Arturia." Xander smirked as the now named woman spluttered in confusion. "It's my mind, outside of the elf and J'onn J'onnz I can skim all of you thoughts just as easily as you can me. I'm willing to bet J'onn can scan us all and if I poured effort into this Mind Gem I could to the same. I don't plan to really do that though. Aside from your identities and general emotions, I'm going to try to stay out of your heads." Xander explained while gesturing with his hands his headache seemingly forgotten.

The taller blonde woman sat down next to Arturia, "Then you can tell that I'm not exactly human, will that be a problem?" She asked calmly. The others began finding seats as well.

Xander tilted his head at her thinking for a moment, "No, I don't think so most of you don't qualify as human, you have the memories of your world's Samantha Carter up to a point and the replicators as well but I don't sense the same sense of hunger or dominance that from you that I feel like a replicator should have. Probably because you are effectively a spiritual or ascended version of your replicator self. I don't sense anything particularly concerning from you. How about this, I get the feeling I'm a little of center due to what I'm pretty sure is brain damage and the left over impressions from Nirrti and Tony are fading quickly. I don't really want to hurt any of you and aside from the elf I have no particular reason to distrust you since we can read each others intentions." Xander rambled as he leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes. "If I got hit by a spell my friends likely did as well. So the sooner we sort this mess out the better. Why don't you all tell me what you want or expect of me and I will see if I am willing to work with you?"

A rather awkward discussion followed, especially with the after effects of Xander destroying; Hyena, Tony and, Nirrti left him somewhat off kilter and ruthless. Arturia was willing to work with Xander sensing his inner nobility and heroism. She only requested that she be allowed to try to warn him away from the mistakes she had made. Replicator Sam agreed given that it was only logical when risking destruction otherwise, especially as it seemed she did not have several of the more dangerous commands running her replicator code. Medea agreed happily provided she was allowed to try to warn him of incoming betrayals and if possible to give her a body to experience life with again if he figured it out, the others quickly echoing her wish. The gruff looking man in the leather greatcoat with dreadlocks was named Ronon Dex and agreed to work with Xander to keep an eye on the human replicator, seeing no better option. The elf was named Celebrimbor and extracted a promise from Xander to help defeat a betrayer named Annatar who had killed his wife and child if the opportunity ever arose, before agreeing to submit to Xander. J'onn J'onnz agreed to help him but clarified that if Xander ever become irredeemable in his eyes he would fight against him, which Xander agreed to enthusiastically to the confusion of the others.

* * *

Once all of this was sorted Xander awoke in his empowered state and set his new 'aspects' as he called them to sort out various mental tasks like determining what was causing the unusual events that led to his new state of being. Xander himself went about town fighting and subduing those affected by what he quickly realized was some sort of costume spell. He spent a fair bit of time destroying any true demons he came across as he marched across Sunnydale towards the source of the spell. It rather confused him as several times he started to approach vampires the simply screamed and then burst into ash before he could get within a stone's throw of them. When he realized that Excalibur even sheathed in Avalon was to powerful of a holy object for the vampires to handle, he broke down laughing for a good five minutes. He also set a handful of replicators to begin building disguised weapon emplacements throughout the town to automatically blast anything that walked around without a living body temperature. After a moment of thought he set them to only fire small plasma blasts, not enough to do much than give a human a nasty burn but plenty to set a vamp alight. Just in case they hit something that the sensors got confused about. As he finally got within sight of Ethan's Costume shop Xander sighed in disappointment, as his fears were confirmed. Deciding to be subtle about it he simply phased into Ethan's shop and once finding him in the back room, skimmed the knowledge of how to end the spell from his mind. Xander feeling rather glum about the sense of betrayal he had of the man who he had started to look up to in recent weeks he knocked out Ethan and then threw a bolt of raw kinetic force with the Power Gem at the bust of Janus. Xander felt the spell begin to fade and frowned, it was supposed to end suddenly but shrugged it off as one of the 'added safety features' that had been rattling around Ethan's mind. Xander began to make his way towards the school as Giles' 'classic' car sputtered around the corner at the breakneck speeds of 25 miles per hour.

The next hour was spent explaining his relationship with Ethan and how he had broken the spell. Xander cringed thinking about the reactions of Buffy and Willow to this turn of events. Giles going on about how disappointed he was with Xander as if the nights events had been his fault. After eventually getting away from Giles and heading home Xander flopped onto his bed as he felt the last dregs of the spell fade. Exhaustion hit Xander like a tidal wave as the overflowing power he had felt in his body vanished.

The next morning Xander awoke to an aching body but a remarkable sense of clarity. He could still feel his 'aspects' and could feel himself still slowly absorbing the knowledge and skills of that twisted version of Tony Stark and the parasite claiming to be the goddess Nirrti. He grinned in happiness at that development. A quick physical check told him aside from a somewhat improved physique he no longer had the impressive abilities of the Martian Manhunter or even the Humanform Replicator. Still he felt better than he had in a long time despite the soreness.

When he got up to get dressed he noticed something else that filled his stomach with a tingling mixture of giddy excitement and fear. His items were still real, he couldn't find Excalibur or Avalon but everything else was still there and still working.

Only now he had to ask himself one question, does he tell anyone about his new loot or not?

* * *

 **Author's Basement: Hey Folks another one of those short chapters, I had a real bear getting this one down and I'm not all that happy with it. Honestly I need a co-writer who can get in my head space or at least on the same wavelength so I can collaborate with someone a bit. Initially I wanted to do a a lot more with the actual Halloween event and truly having someone to help me flesh out the dialogue and fluff up the description's would make this much better in my opinion. Oh as for Hard Drive Hero or Gamer: Odyssey I hope to get back to at least G:O soon but life and lack of someone to bounce things off of and keep me on track is slowing me down. I guess I can ask for anyone interested in co-writing to PM me with some sort of application. Anyways Today is an off day and I hope to have less of them in the future.**


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